


Live a Little

by SmilinStar



Category: The Tomorrow People (2013)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-09
Updated: 2014-02-09
Packaged: 2018-01-11 16:20:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1175185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SmilinStar/pseuds/SmilinStar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Trust me." Set after Episode 1x13</p>
            </blockquote>





	Live a Little

**Author's Note:**

> Gah, I love these two. This show has so many problems but John and Astrid continue to be my favourite thing about it and I love the idea of them together somewhere down the line. They could balance each other out so perfectly. Anyway I couldn’t get them out of my head and this is the result.

 

 

“Do you trust me?” he asks.

 

It stings a little when a disbelieving smile crosses her lips and she looks away with a shake of her head. Her eyes read, “Why would you ask me that?”

 

He’s a glutton for punishment apparently and he knows her answer, but yet he’d asked her anyway.

 

He may have saved her life, and she may have pulled a bullet out of him with her bare fingers. They may have bared the tiniest parts of their souls in those small moments, but it wasn’t enough for blind, leaping off the edge of a cliff, trust.

 

They don’t know each other. Not really.

 

Yet, he couldn’t help himself.

 

Stephen’s plea and his promise to protect her had stuck with him.

 

Cast out from his people, there wasn’t a lot for him to do on the ground, except survive.

 

At least down there, he’d had more purpose. Lead, protect, teach.

 

Here, on his own, it was only _survive_.

 

Those thoughts had played around in his head for days, and it wasn’t until he’d stopped on a park bench to rest his weary legs and was greeted by the sight of kids playing blissfully unaware on the climbing frames that he’d remembered remnants of a conversation that had been lost to him in a haze of pain.

 

Two girls and a boy.

 

Tokyo.

 

Surfing.

 

_Always been fighting to survive. Never thought about how I’d want to live if I had the option. Never had dreams like that._

And just like that he had begun to feel the flow of purpose in his veins again, reaching the tips of his fingers and the soles of his feet.

 

He’d smiled into the open air and thrown one last glance to a childhood he’d never had and for the first time hadn’t felt the pangs of regret.

 

He had had only one destination in mind.

 

The here and now.

 

She opens the door with a frown and a tremor in her hand.

 

The smile on his face disappears.

 

She doesn’t look anything like the Astrid he remembers.

 

Tired, drawn, no spark, no light.

 

“Hey.”

 

“How did you find me? What are you doing here?”

 

He doesn’t answer any of her questions, simply asks one of his own, “Can I come in?”

 

He can see the wariness in her eyes. She looks over his shoulders, down to the empty street. The caution, the guardedness hurts. She shouldn’t have to be living like this.

 

“Okay,” she finally relents and steps aside to let him in.

 

She slides the bolt across the door once he’s through, and then follows with the chain, and the turn of the key in the keyhole.

 

“I heard what happened. I’m sorry.”

 

The words meet her retreating back, and he follows after.

 

She heads for the kitchen and puts the width of the wooden breakfast table between them.

 

“Not your fault,” she says.

 

He thinks maybe it is. Maybe he could have done more to protect her. Maybe she would have hated him, but maybe he should have tried to keep her down there with them. At least until they had known for sure that it was safe.

 

“You can’t live like this Astrid.”

 

She scoffs, and her voice takes on a hard edge, “You can talk.”

 

“Yeah,” he breathes out with a half laugh, not born from amusement of any sort, “Yeah I can.”

 

“What do you want?”

 

“To help.”

 

“How?” she asks, and though the word comes out hard and angry, he can see the plea in her eyes.

 

“Do you trust me?” he asks.

 

The answer is there in the shake of her head, the play of her lips and the regret in her eyes.

 

He rounds the table until he’s standing there, towering over her.

 

She shrinks away, but he gently grabs hold of her arm and ducks down to catch her eyes with his.

 

“Trust me,” he whispers.

 

The change is subtle but it plays gloriously out on her face. She doesn’t answer him but the small nod of her head is enough.

 

He holds on a little tighter and engulfs them both in the familiar buzz of teleportation.

 

When they land, it is in the middle of darkness and he can feel her trembling against him.

 

“Trust me,” he says again.

 

And then with a little flicker in his mind, he pulls on the light switch.

 

He watches as she squints open her eyes, adjusting to the new found brightness. His eyes don’t leave her face and he doesn’t even realise he’s holding his breath for her reaction.

 

She looks around him, still entirely bewildered.

 

“Where are . . . ”

 

The question dies on her lips, because recognition dawns and he can’t help but smile.

 

She turns back to him, “Is this . . ? Are we . . ?”

 

He nods, smiling wider.

 

“I can’t believe this!” she says, and then she laughs, “Carnegie Hall? You teleported us to Carnegie Hall?”

 

“Yep.”

 

“Holy crap!”

 

He laughs, spins around and runs down the stairs off the stage into the sea of red seats and golden trimmings.

 

“Where are you going?” she calls out after him.

 

“Getting the best seat in the house” he says.

 

“We’re going to get caught!”

 

He winks up at her, “Live a little!”

 

She shakes her head, but she is now smiling so wide, and he can’t help the warmth spreading through him. There she was. There was the Astrid he remembered.

 

“You’re not expecting a show are you?”

 

He laughs as he chooses a seat in the centre, with a perfect view and stretches his long legs out on to the seat in front of him.

 

“I believe Bucket List Item One was ‘sing at Carnegie Hall’.”

 

“This wasn’t quite how I imagined it.”

 

“Think of it as a dress rehearsal for the real thing.”

 

“I’m not singing for you.”

 

“Why not?” he answers with a grin, “You’ve done it before.”

 

“You remember that?”

 

He doesn’t, not really. Just a small snippet before he was lost to memories he’d rather have not revisited.

 

“Please?” he asks, and he pouts and gives her his best puppy dog eyes.

 

She shakes her head and laughs again, but he can see her resolve melt.

 

“Are you gonna help me with the rest of my list then?”

 

“Can’t really help you with the Japanese I’m afraid,” he counted off on his fingers, “Tokyo. Hmm I wish I could say I could teleport across oceans, but I’m pretty sure I can get you as far as LaGuardia Airport, if that helps any?”

 

He sits up a little straighter, “Surfing, now that I can help you with.”

 

And he knows what comes next and he can see she knows it too. He’s caught a little off-guard when she pulls on the reins and takes charge, “And the three kids? You’re gonna help with those too?”

 

He crosses his arms across his chest, sits back and stares back at her, “Maybe.”

 

She laughs, an embarrassed smile on her lips, and he can’t help but think she’s beautiful.

 

“Are you gonna sing for me or not?”

 

“Fine,” she says, “But I’m singing for me.”

 

And he can’t help the little burst of pride he feels ripple through him.

 

Mission: Accomplished.

 

He waves his hand out in front of him.

 

She takes the prompt, takes centre stage, closes her eyes and loses herself to the moment.

 

As her voice fills the magnificent hall around him, he can’t help but think.

 

This.

 

This is living.

 


End file.
